format_quote Originally Posted by
Guestfellow
We created these problems in the first place if you look at history. It is our responsibility to take care of those in less fortunate than we are. That is why Muslims pay Zakat. To help poor people.
People only care about themselves. They honestly do not care about those less fortunate than us, if they did, we not have people starving and dying of diseases that can be treated.
Exactly!!
There is a saying of the prophet muhammad(pbuh) that if all the people of the world payed zakat(charity as prescribed in Islam) there will be non left starving on the face of this earth. We will have to answer before ALLAH(swt) for those people.
Now as you can see poor and destitute people, there are also extremely filthy rich people who do all kinds of strange things with their money, some who burn it for entertainment, some who has given his wealth to his dog wife/husband.
I could argue that at some point in time those poor and destitute were not like that.
One example in Islamic history (I 'm sure there are others in non-Islamic history) During the reign of caliph Umar(r.a.) there was excess in the zakat money/food because there was absolutely nobody left poor that they gave it away to the birds to eat.